Smart Meter installation warning!

[Dwaindibbly]

I got a call from OVO yesterday asking if I wanted one. I said that I didn’t because I had one when I was with British Gas, which now doesn’t work so I didn’t want one until they are compatible with all providers.
The woman on the phone told me that all meters fitted will be upgradable via software to be compatible with all providers by the end of my contact l, which is a fixed 2 year deal

 

[samcat]

I got a call from OVO yesterday asking if I wanted one. I said that I didn’t because I had one when I was with British Gas, which now doesn’t work so I didn’t want one until they are compatible with all providers.
The woman on the phone told me that all meters fitted will be upgradable via software to be compatible with all providers by the end of my contact l, which is a fixed 2 year deal

Only true if they install a SMETs2 meter, according to their own engineers they are currently still using up stock of SMETs1 meters.

 

[jpaul]

Did anyone hear the complete radio 4 you & yours article on smart meters today ? - summary seemed to be
- there are 80/EIGHTY SMETs2 meters installed in the country
- this whole fiasco is costing £12 billion, was it? , which represents 20 new hospitals
basically it is like HS2 , but, not even a prestigous vanity project.

 

[LeeUK]

Can't fund the NHS but we can spend £12 billion on meters we don't need. You couldn't make it up.

 

[BigBoy]

Well over ⅔ of the £12Billion is coming from the private sector, it's not as if the government or you and I are funding smart metering...

I work for one of the Big 6 energy firms installing meters (not just smart), to install a meter (any meter) it costs the company an average of £400, they have also spent nearly £70k on my equipment, van and training 18 months of it.

 

[NeilF]

Well over ⅔ of the £12Billion is coming from the private sector, it's not as if the government or you and I are funding smart metering...

I work for one of the Big 6 energy firms installing meters (not just smart), to install a meter (any meter) it costs the company an average of £400, they have also spent nearly £70k on my equipment, van and training 18 months of it.

Where is the money coming from then?

Surely the most obvious means of it being paid for are simply energy bills going up?

 

[pinkpound]

Where is the money coming from then?

Surely the most obvious means of it being paid for are simply energy bills going up?

Mum had hers installed by BG 2 years ago and took out fixed price 18 months at the time . It came to end in November and guess what only 1 offer of a fixed price , the price increased by over £200 over her last fixed price . So we tried it with her brothers who's with BG but no smart meter and he had 4 fixed price offers at £150 cheaper than her previous fixed price.

Only way for her to get cheaper is to move and lose smart meter features

 

[LeeUK]

Well over ⅔ of the £12Billion is coming from the private sector, it's not as if the government or you and I are funding smart metering...

Where is the money coming from then?

Surely the most obvious means of it being paid for are simply energy bills going up?

This.

What is the private sector getting out of it after funding smart meters then?

I assume the only private sector involved are the energy companies and it's the customers of those energy companies who are paying.

I'd rather some of my energy bill go towards funding the NHS than some greedy smart meter company.

 

[BigBoy]

Smart metering is being paid for out of the companies profits as it has to by government decree, they are not allowed to increase tariffs based in usage or change more to have one installed, offgem would rip them apart if that was happening.

In reality residential electrical usage makes very little profit as overheads are so high, 90% of profit is from generation and business sales.

The cost of £12b is not for the roll out of meters but the government backed scheme of smets2 the infrastructure required to operate it and the software development required for it as well as the security.

O2 (Telephonica) are the provider for connections, they are eating nearly £6b of that budget just to operate the mobile network they already run...

What are the energy providers getting from it?
Generation patterns mainly, i.e. how and when to produce more power, what times usage is high so rather than having wasted generation (very common at the moment) we can generate to demand.

 

[jpaul]

Mum had hers installed by BG 2 years ago and took out fixed price 18 months at the time . It came to end in November and guess what only 1 offer of a fixed price , the price increased by over £200 over her last fixed price . So we tried it with her brothers who's with BG but no smart meter and he had 4 fixed price offers at £150 cheaper than her previous fixed price.
Only way for her to get cheaper is to move and lose smart meter features

I would contact ombudsman, they cannot restrict your tarif options if you have a smart meter, as BigBoy said.

Smart metering is being paid for out of the companies profits as it has to by government decree .

Are you saying, though, they cannot increase tarif's for everyone (or not reduce them with reduced USSR gas and green/windmills generation costs) to boost profit and finance the smart meters?

What are the energy providers getting from it?
Generation patterns mainly, i.e. how and when to produce more power, what times usage is high so rather than having wasted generation (very common at the moment) we can generate to demand.

is there ability to model usage behaviour really increased that much beyond current capability (with a few smart meters in some sample of the populations homes, if necessary)

 

[BigBoy]

Tariffs are product dependant, over 80% of house holds are on a standard variable tarrif, this nets huge amounts of profit, those of us who get fixed rates cannot and will not be punished for smart meter installations.

What the companies cannot do is over inflate tariffs to pay for smart rollout even over time, offgem are all over it like a rash at the moment.

Generation modeling is a difficult one to answer as it outside my field but from what I understand the more data they have the more efficient generation can become meaning it gets cleaner (especially coal and nuculnu production).

 

[wesimmo]

There's a massive cost involved in meter reading, the idea will be that the reduction in that offsets the cost of the meters over time.

Unfortunately though, the whole roll out has been a balls up and the fines for companies not meeting targets will be huge too.

 

[BigBoy]

There's a massive cost involved in meter reading, the idea will be that the reduction in that offsets the cost of the meters over time.

Unfortunately though, the whole roll out has been a balls up and the fines for companies not meeting targets will be huge too.

Yep this 10000% not a chance in hell of any company meeting 85% smart metered by 2020 as the government want. We are currently installing 10,000 a week and still not going to meet out targets.

 

[MissChief]

I keep being asked if I want one and I keep saying no thanks. As above the current ones only work with the provider that installs them so I'll be staying away until next year anyway. I tend to change every 12-18 months.

 

[Peerzy]

I have a smart meter by FirstUtility currently for my electricity which is nice and they now want to install one for the gas but I'm put off by people saying "hold on 18 months and then you'll be able to move suppliers with the same meter". I've no reason to leave FU currently but don't want to have a smart meter installed only to find out waiting a little bit could ensure a much better cross company version.

 

[BigBoy]

I work for EDF, the Smart meters we install can be firmware upgraded to smets2 and so can a lot of the other providers.

The gas meters work by local zigbee connection to the electric meter then the electric meter sends the data off to the company, so only the electric meter would need to be changed/upgraded to smets2 in the future.

 

[jpaul]

the Smart meters we install can be firmware upgraded to smets2

samcat's earlier comment (linked below) was persuasive for me that the home displays on the older OVO's were poor, I don't know how others compare or whether these can be changed between supplier, so that I could buy a good after-market display (if that exists) and get it to work with a smets2/s1.

Horses for courses, but I for one *would* let them install it again given the choice knowing what I know now. Its nice not having to take meter readings, its nice being able to see how my usage is shaping up day by day with regards the bill, so no surprises.
The in home display lives in a draw now, not used. As I said above it doesnt work, OVO are aware of this and will be releasing a new version at some point BUT customers with the old one WONT get the new one :/ .

(I want to know how much electrcity individual products consume, so anything the display can do to help is good eg. if it gives me accurate KWh every 5 minutes that would help me 'profile' products - a bit geeky probably)

 

[checjb]

Nice to hear BigBoy but I'm going to wait until I can get a smets2 meter in one go. Never mind the fact that I have to take a day off to get one installed, the real issue for me is that I have now had 3 smart meters. I haven't declined to get one from Ovo purely because it is such a waste. The environmental impact alone must be horrendous. It's reminded me that reading my meters actually takes less than 2 minutes in total (inc uploading the data). I can manage that once a month.

 

[samcat]

samcat's earlier comment (linked below) was persuasive for me that the home displays on the older OVO's were poor, I don't know how others compare or whether these can be changed between supplier, so that I could buy a good after-market display (if that exists) and get it to work with a smets2/s1.

(I want to know how much electrcity individual products consume, so anything the display can do to help is good eg. if it gives me accurate KWh every 5 minutes that would help me 'profile' products - a bit geeky probably)

you cannot fit an aftermarket display to Smets1/2, only the energy provider can do this.

However, it sounds like most of your needs could be answered with a simple energy usage monitor.. Previously I have used a YourLoop, Measured gas AND electric usage, worked well but didnt cope with solar panels (measured export as import).. Have also had a very cheap GeoMinim, this also couldnt cope with Solar but for the price was a great bit of kit. Electric only, but worked very well and the display is about 100x better than any of the in home displays I have seen so far!

 

[ahar]

There's a massive cost involved in meter reading, the idea will be that the reduction in that offsets the cost of the meters over time.

That was a part of the business case, but I seem to remember individual energy efficiency (driven by a better view of what energy you're using and the ability to get a tariff that gives you cheaper energy in an off period based on market demand) make up a larger proportion of the savings.

I worked on smart meters project when it was first coming together in government. Seemed like a bad idea at the time . Looks like I was proved right.